I'll begin my review of Black Panther Wakanda forever by getting the following out of the way first. The over the top usage of African symbolism and cultural elements in this film feels rather cynical to me, because if you want to celebrate. Africa and African culture. That's fine, but the Black Panther films were only made to make money just like any other Hollywood blockbuster, do not lose sight of this in the whole media buzz about black empowerment from the hysterics on social media.
It seems a lot of people have fallen for the marketing campaign about this being an important film for the black community. The film isn't going to help African tourism. It's not even made in Africa. It just caches. In on the place, the proceeds of the film aren't going to go towards black businesses. The film isn't going to help address the issues of black fatherless homes. The film merely panders to black people. The film is, after all, merely a corporate product marketed at the black community, with a view towards generating profits, goodwill, and positive brand sentiment. For Disney, it feels more like a giant virtue signal. In my opinion, there's an overuse Of African cultural motifs in this film that just comes across as patronizing to Africans.
Now, I acknowledge that all of this that Wakanda the city. It's based on the comic books and it's supposed to be. A highly visually stylized futurist interpretation of African culture, but with all of that said, in some instances I believe it's just a bit much from the design of the aircraft to some of the over the top costumes to the way in which the holographic barrier of the city of Wauconda. Is Decloaked and opened in one particular scene. The guards in the Watchtower press a button, and these water drums float up out of the floor and then the guards play the drums and the Shields of the city come down. So there's this completely over the top and unnecessary fusion of African like cultural themes infused into a high tech environment. But it just becomes silly. There's no reason that's such an important piece of technology like the highly sophisticated shroud to the city must be activated. And deactivated by means of such an elaborate and decorative musical instrument, it's just ridiculous pandering and condescension to African culture. A society capable of developing such incredible technology would seek to implement the simplest and most practical interface in order to make it work. Which would be a simple control button, mechanism or switch. We get it.
Wakanda is supposed to be in Africa and these people are all African, therefore Africanized all the things in the set and production design, even if it's totally unnecessary and out of place. Anyway, with all of that out of the way, as you know, the star of the first Black Panther film, Chadwick Boseman passed away two years ago, and so his character of Coachella is written out of the movie. He's killed off by a disease that his sister Shuri tried to save him from, so Wauconda no longer has a Black Panther to protect it from those who wish to exploit Wakanda for its resources, such as vibranium, which is the main plot point which the international community want Wakandans to share with them. But the sovereign Queen Mother. Ramonda refuses because she distrusts them, so right off the bat there's an. To hear I'm with Chris Gore when he was speaking on the Nerdrotic podcast recently, they really should have recast to Chawla because this film is just centered around the secondary characters of the Black Panther franchise and specifically the female characters. As much as Letitia Wright is a fine actress, she lacks the presence. To be A major superhero primary character in my opinion.
Now I do acknowledge that the recasting of Coachella would have been a difficult adjustment for audiences, but a fitting tribute could still have been made to Chadwick Boseman and a new actor could have had his own take on the character in much the same way that there's been lots of superheroes recast with different actors. Over the years, if the film was good, people would have accepted this anyway. To make matters worse, they killed off the character off screen from a virus or something. Because I guess current year stuff, right? You don't even see touch Ally in the movie. Now obviously like I say I'm against to Challe being killed off, but if I was making this film and I was instructed that I had to kill off the character of Coachella, here's what I would have done because I was thinking exactly the same thing that Gary and Chris and all the guys. On Nerdrotic, we're think. As well, I know many of you would have thought exactly the same way because it was so obvious what they should have done was they could have had a 5 to 10 minute opening sequence.
An action scene used some CGI and digital trickery, and have Chadwick Boseman in a few scenes. Maybe there's some reusable dialogue that could have been spliced together and repurposed. From other films. To create a few useful lines. Maybe there's some useful deleted scenes from other films. I'm thinking something similar to Carrie Fisher's appearance in Rise of Skywalker or how they finished fast and Furious 7 with CGI Paul Walker. I mean, maybe, depending on how this alternative opening was done, you might get away without having to Charla say anything at all. It could have been all done with CG. And the great thing is, it all becomes so much easier to do once to. Charla puts on the Black Panther outfit because you can't see his face. So he runs out there and fights a bad guy at the beginning of the movie. It's a big battle and he dies heroically saving Wakanda. And that's your opening scene, not this week dying off screen of a disease. Crap, that doesn't do the character any justice. That was not a dignified way for him to die, allowing him to die heroically in battle is the most respectful send off you can give him, but what we got in the film was so poorly executed and the reason I think. We got what they ultimately ended up going with is because by not recasting Chawla with another black male actor. They had the opportunity to have another gender swap and make Black Panther a woman a small part of me cannot shake the feeling that the death of Chadwick Boseman presented an opportunity for yet more. M She you because Shuri becomes the black. Panther in this film. So now the Black Panther is female. So the ongoing Hollywood trend of recasting male characters with female versions essentially continues, and one cannot help, but at least observe that in this film, and the film is woke. I mean, surely refers to Martin Freeman character Everett Ross as her favorite colonizer. And they have to go and see a young black female college student named RiRi who was so super smart that she not only helps the white guy with his science project, but she built a vibranium detector as her own science project. But her professor said she'd never be able to Do it to which she replied to young, gifted and black rice. Again more divisive identity politics, because America really needs more of that. Right now, right? She's 19 and she built a suit similar to Tony Stark, Iron Man suit and she becomes Ironheart. Without giving away the highly convoluted and profoundly uninteresting plot, I found this film at shore to watch. It's not the longest MCU film, but it feels like the longest 1, the villain name or or no more.
There's a couple of different pronunciations. He's probably the strongest presence in the film. He's a member of an underwater Kingdom, and they also have vibranium, but his motivations as a villain. Are quite weak. The rest of the casts are pretty uninteresting, and the problem really is there is a touch Alice sized hole in this film. There's a lot of moving around the place. There's lots of locations and characters. But even though sure E is now the primary character, she doesn't feel like the primary character. It just feels like the film is missing a primary character that we're just watching scene after scene with the secondary characters. And of course. That's exactly what's going on here. The primary character is missing, and his absence is felt, and he could have been in this film. If the character of Coachella had have been recast with a different black male actor.
Now, of course, there's no replacing Chadwick Boseman, I acknowledged that, but he could have been succeeded by someone. What's more, the cast is seriously lacking strong male characters, which of course, is certainly in keeping with the message. It's primarily a female cast. The only prominent male characters. In this film are Everett, Ross Namor and M Baku. The prominent female characters are Shuri Okoye. Iori, Anika Ramonda and Valentina Allegra de Fontaine. That's seven women to three men. These films are pure social engineering because they present men as weak and largely surplus to requirements, but the women are perfect. Their strong leaders there geniuses. They're physically stronger. And then it just goes on and on. There's nothing they can't do. And I know this is sci-fi and I know there can be supernatural justifications for things like women having super strength, but it doesn't change the fact that all the sci-fi fantasy elements do our enable an agenda. I thought this film was supposed to be made for the black community, right? Not just the black female community. I mean, yeah, they want everyone to pay money to see the film, but wasn't this film primarily aimed at the black community? And yet it doesn't provide a positive message or role models for both sexes. Women are told they don't need no man and men are made out to be unnecessary and we. And in need of female leadership, so there's no strong male role model. For black boys. That doesn't sound very empowering or inspirational to the black community. Does it like any race of people? Black people need strong male and female role models as much as any other people do.
So do yourself a favor. Don't pay money to see this film. Don't even watch the Film. it's mediocre, insulting, and probably the most boring film I've watched in a very long time. The MCU has hit another new low.